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Defense attorneys said the charges should have been dropped months ago and spared their clients unnecessary jail time. One of the attorneys said authorities ignored video evidence that he said proves his client's innocence.

"It makes no sense whatsoever. I mean, it was bad before, but this is worse," defense attorney Mark Van Bavel said.

"We have to get away from the notion of arresting first and then investigating after the fact," defense attorney Russell Neverdon said.

Police ended up arresting and charging Antwon Morton and Samuel Rogers on murder and witness intimidation charges. They have been incarcerated since September.

Neverdon, who represents Morton, said he has video evidence that shows Morton could not have been at the scene of the shooting.

Neverdon said the shooting was at 11:22 p.m. He said a screenshot of surveillance video shows Morton at a house at 11:18 p.m. Neverdon said the video shows Morton in a tank-top near the same house at 11:28 p.m.

"(It's) physically and humanly impossible to travel that distance to be able to carry out that act between 11:18 and 11:27 and then to change your clothes completely," Neverdon said.

Neverdon said he had this video footage within a week of the shooting and presented it to city prosecutors and to the police.

"It is poor oversight of the obvious," Neverdon said.

Van Bavel, who represents Rogers. said his client's girlfriend went to police and said she was with Rogers when the shooting happened. He said prosecutors continued to rely on the one witness who identified Rogers and Morton at the scene of what ended up being a high-profile case.

The State's Attorney's Office disputed the attorneys' claims. Deputy State's Attorney Tammy Brown said in a statement: "While we can't comment on the details of the pending case, the allegation that we were presented with exculpatory evidence and ignored it is false. The reason the charges were dismissed is a direct result of the investigation that we undertook to corroborate the evidence."

The attorneys said they're also upset prosecutors are still pursuing the witness intimidation charge, which is set to start Friday.